Brand loyalty is a key ingredient for any business’ success and sustainability at the top of the market. Cementing this business-consumer relationship means living and breathing customer feedback into your products or services. Capturing customer feedback has innovated businesses, taken them off paths of decline and given the consumer a sense of participation in the vision of the brand they love. As Katie Jansen from AppLovin states “Customers will feel more connected to the brand if they open up a two-way dialogue”
So, what are the secrets to success for businesses that have elevated from taking customer feedback?
Why is customer feedback so important?
Think about the stages of introducing a new product – while your market research gives you an idea if potential customers would be willing to buy it, it’s only based on assumption rather than reality. Only after your consumers use your product or services can you really learn about their actual experiences with it and measure its success. It’s important to note also that their needs and expectations evolve over time and customer service therefore is the finger on the pulse of any product you run.
Customer feedback is also needed for the future decision making processes of your business. Taking into consideration the suggestions and needs of your customers tells you were to allocate your money to get the highest return of investment. It tells you whether further product development or brand promotion is where your priorities lie. Therefore, customer loyalty can save a huge amount from your budget and maximise profits.
What are the benefits of it?
The largest benefit you can get from collecting customer feedback is the image it gives your business to your consumers and other would-be consumers that turns into wider exposure. For your previous customers, by immediately reacting and finding a solution to any dissatisfaction, you ensure that you prevent unhappy customers going online to complain about your product and damaging brand image.
Surveys indicate that one happy customer can lead to nine referrals and that 97% of potential buyers admit that online reviews influence their decision to make a purchase or walk away. This shows that in the age of social media, keeping your customer base happy and making them feel listened to is essential to bring in other clients to your business. This can be seen as an indirect form of inbound marketing, where new customers come to you without you needing to fork out for a big campaign.
How can I capture customer feedback?
A plethora of different software, websites and techniques have been developed to provide businesses with the most up-to-date ways of capturing feedback.
One commonly used and expected method is proactive live chat support. 44% of online shoppers feel the best feature an eCommerce website can have is a live chat. This interactive interface can address many issues from customers unable to locate desired items or answer questions about availability and shipping. This direct interaction helps a company to get closer to its customers by understanding their needs and challenges better, as well as identifying recurring issues and patterns to feedback to the business. This, in turn, means not only is a business showing it cares is there for its customers, but it can find long-term solutions for issues preventing its sales processes and growth. Feedback forms, surveys, polls and focus groups are other methods commonly used.
It’s also important to consistently assess your methods of collecting feedback, for websites like SiteGround, they ask for a rating between one to five stars for the quality of the customer service rep after the chat. This is a great way to ensure that your team fronting the customer service keep themselves to standard and that the quality of your customer feedback is genuine and authentic.
What do I then do with customer feedback?
It is one thing to take customer feedback, but another to make use of it. Only 52% of customers are confident about brands acting on their feedback – showing a current barrier in brand loyalty is trust. A typical answer to this would be transcribing and analysing the data given before creating an output with simple-to-read graphs, quotes, and stats that can be viewed and discussed by relevant teams in meetings, before culminating into brainstorming for change and innovation in the business.
For Julia Hartz, CEO of Eventbrite, creating a customer feedback form, observing user-behaviour and then analysing the different use-cases with a focus on where the customers are coming from was what grew her company from a simple ticket app to the full-service platform for event creators we see today. Similarly, founder of LinkedIn Reid Hoffman states “I believe customer feedback is the coiled spring that catapults your company forward. It will continually adjust your trajectory while keeping you on target.”
Being in touch with customers – especially the increasingly-powerful millennial base – is essential in growing your business. AIESEC provides ambitious youth ready to put your business in touch with their world. Check out our partners portal to find out more.
